It ain't over 'til the fat lady sings

BikeBiz.com is pro-helmet, anti-compulsion. Here's an up-to-date index of the stories carried on Martlew's private members' bill 'protective headgear for young cyclists' and the post-Martrew period, including the Nov. 04 BMA call for helmet compulsion for all adult and child cyclists.

Martlew's bill needs to be fought tooth and nail by anybody who cares about the health of children in this country.

Every child death is sad but it's ludicrous to force children off bicycles because a handful of children (some of whom may have been wearing ill-fitting helmets) die from cycle-related injuries.

Bodies such as the British Medical Association say many more lives will be lost through sedentary lifestyles than saved by helmet compulsion. The minimal risks of cycling are outweighed 20:1 by the health benefits.

Cycling could die a death of a thousand cuts as cycle amenities the length of Britiain are forced to ban cycling because of fears of litigation.

Far from being the rantings of "cycling fascists", as Martlew claims, the anti-compulsion argument is an overwhelmingly strong one, but will it be heeded by MPs?

Those MPs minded to vote for Martlew should get themselves into the House of Commons library and read this detailed report from HoC library researchers:

Humourist and Guardian-columnist Guy Browning urges the widespread and daily use of cycle helmets. But not just for cyclists. Stats and studies show that helmet use should be encouraged for all manner of daily routines. Driving? Wear a cycle helmet. Having a bath? Wear a cycle helmet.

Eric Martlew, the Labour MP for Carlisle, said earlier today he will reintroduce his plans to get the government to force children to wear helmets when cycling. Details are scant at the moment but it's probable that Martlew will table an amendment to the Road Safety Bill. He will use the BMA's volte face on helmets as a supportive argument. BikeBiz.com has a petition online, urging the BMA to go back to being pro-helmet, anti-compulsion.

If cyclists are forced to wear helmets, how long will it be before 'on me 'ead, son' isn't a footballer's request for a pass, it's a stipulation that footie players must also wear hard hats? A ludicrous suggestion? Not so. In America, 'soccer helmets', similar to those used in Aussie rules football, are becoming more and more popular, much to the chagrin of footballing organisations who say soccer is "safe"...

A new report from the UK's Transport Research Laboratory claims that previous European statistics relating to the death and injury of 'Vulnerable Road Users' have been seriously underestimated due to under-reporting. The report shows that 12 400 cyclists and pedestrians are killed by cars each year in the European Union. Cycle helmet compulsionists will latch on to these figures as 'proof' cyclists need to be forced to wear helmets when, in fact, this is 'victim blaming' and what would save many more lives would be campaigning to make car makers produce 'softer' cars and local authorities create safer streets...

Wednesday 24th November: No to cycle helmet compulsion, argues Thought for the Day correspondent

Writer Anne Atkins is a regular on Thought for the Day, the Today programme's daily religio-political snippet. This morning's slot was about freedom of choice. Radio 4's morning news programme often sets the news agenda for the day and is listened to avidly by politicians. Here's a transcript...

Take a look at these qualifications: MA MB BChir (Cantab.), MFPHM, MRCGP, MBA.* Impressive, huh? Dr Richard Keatinge is a bright bloke. Maybe the BMA - now in favour of cycle helmet compulsion - will listen to him? He's concerned that helmet compulsionists only quote from a skewed selection of reports, some of which are viewed with suspicion by statisticians. Opposing views, based on robust science, are swept under the carpet. He's out to change that.

The trade sector that would benefit the most from helmet compulsion is against helmet compulsion. Huh? But what about all the juicy profits from selling millions of helmets? For sure there would be an initial rise in helmet sales but at a massive cost: less cyclists in the long-run. Less cycling equals more pollution, more congestion, more kids on sofas and not saddles.

1 in 8 of those signing our BMA helmet petition are doctors. When the British Medical Journal polled readers on how best to promote cycle safety, helmet compulsion came seventh out of seven available options*. So, if rank and file doctors are against forcing all cyclists to wear helmets, who nobbled the BMA?

The decision of the Board of the Directorate of Professional Activities of the British Medical Association to lobby for cycle helmet compulsion for adults and children is causing a stink in the medical and cycling worlds. The BMA's volte face could make it easier for the UK government to enact compulsion legislation, which would be bonkers when cycling is one of the solutions to slimming the nation. Sign this online petition. It will be handed to the BMA.

Saturday 6th November: All child and adult cyclists should be forced to don lids, argues BMA

In a submission ahead of the publication of the UK government's Public Health White Paper - due within the next few days and which contains many favourable plugs for cycling - the British Medical Association argues for a raft of health measures, including cycle helmet compulsion. This is a massive about-face: since 1999, the BMA has argued that the health benefits of cycling outweigh all of the (comparatively low) risks. The BMA still does, but argues the case for cycle helmet compulsion. And not just for children. Odd, but the BMA does not argue for helmet wearing by motorists yet, according to an Australian study, such a measure would save three times more lives than airbags. There's a link to this study within, how about sending it to BHIT, the BMA and Eric Martlew MP?

The MP for Carlisle said he would not let the helmet compulsion debate rest and he's been true to his word. Last week in Parliament, Martlew aired the issue with Tony McNulty, the under-secretary of State for Transport. Martlew attacked the DfT-based National Cycling Strategy Board for its stance on helmets and put the boot into the CTC again. McNulty also criticised the CTC and said he'd investigate the NCSB... And all this in the week that cycling was placed centre stage by the House of Commons health committee on obesity. Perhaps some obese MPs could take a cycle trip to helmet-free Holland, check out the lack of a head trauma epidemic and shed a few kilos of blubber in the process?

There have been many bicycle helmet studies undertaken worldwide. Edinburgh University's Professor Aziz Sheikh and colleagues from the Health Commission and Imperial College London have read four of them, and, in a top medical journal, are arguing Eric Martlew's kid-lid bill didn't go far enough, all cyclists should be forced to wear cycle helmets. Professor Sheikh's views have been picked up by the Press Association and syndicated helmet stories are starting to appear all over the mainstream media.

Bicycle helmet manufacturers are careful not to over-state the protective abilities of their wares. But politicians, newspaper headline writers and, it seems, police officers, appear to believe polystyrene lids are effective in the sort of smashes nothing less than Volvo-type steel roll-cages would be of use. According to the Hull Daily Mail, a cycling lollipop lady in Hull died not only because she was ran down by a cement mixer but because she wasn't wearing a bicycle helmet...

According to a new, Bell-sponsored survey by the Safe Kids campaign  presented by Linda Armstrong Kelly, mother of Lance Armstrong - fewer than half of all US children wear helmets while cycling. In states with mandatory helmet laws, 52 percent of child cyclists were seen wearing helmets, as opposed to 42 percent in states with no helmet laws. Surprisingly, despite stating "the number one killer of kids [is] motor vehicle crashes", Safe Kids does not promote helmet wearing for children in cars...

Reading paediatric nurse Angie Lee, founder of the Bicycle Helmet Initiative Trust, said she had learned from the recent lid-law for kids campaign and will continue to push for compulsion. But will government departments continue to fund an organisation that claimed it was a helmet promotion charity but which turned into a single-issue political lobby group?

Philip Darnton, the chair of the government-appointed National Cycling Strategy Board, was at today's second reading of Eric Martlew's helmet compulsion Bill in the House of Commons. He welcomed the Bill's demise and said cycling groups should now be "joined at the hip" with the Department of Transport to promote safe cycling. Helmets are about 'victims', he said, the debate should now move on to the causes of unsafe cycling.

Forth scuppered Eric Martlew's child helmet cycle bill on a technicality earlier today. MPs and ministers are said to be worried about receiving letters from grieving parents claiming their children would be alive if only helmet compulsion legislation had been enacted. Are they right to be worried?

In a heated, emotional debate in the House of Commons this morning, the roads minister was let off the hook by not having to reveal the government's position on Eric Martlew's helmet bill. However, Martlew says he wants to form an all-party parliamentary group to push for compulsion at a later stage. He had better get better at culling facts: he ridiculed the bicycle trade for, he said, putting sales of cycles ahead of children's safety. His evidence for this? Philip Darnton, chair of the National Cycling Strategy Board, is MD of Raleigh. Really?

BBC.co.uk has a video interview with Eric Martlew, the MP who wants children under 16 to be forced to wear helmets. But does Mr Martlew believe people should buy helmets with the best safety features and tested to the toughest international standards so children are truly protected? Er, no. He said there were helmets available from supermarkets that "cost less than a fiver."

BHIT, instigator of Eric Martlew's private members' bill, claims the Bill has the support of 15 medical, road safety and child charities. Maybe, but not the ones that matter. The British Medical Association is anti-compulsion, so is RoSPA. Ditto for the Royal College of General Practitioners and the National Heart Forum. Transport minister Kim Howells doesn't believe compulsion will work.

Download the PDFs here then post, email, or fax them to those MPs who say they will be voting YES to Eric Martlew's helmet compulsion Bill. But be quick, MPs vote on Friday afternoon. Many MPs will not have read the excellent research paper on the Bill from the House of Commons Library, these PDF posters direct them to do so...

Force children to wear helmets and many parents will decide cycling is a dangerous activity, best left well alone. Strap the kids into a "safe" car instead. Those children allowed to cycle could be bought cheap, ill-fitting lids from supermarkets: these may meet British Standards but not the far more stringent Snell and Australian standards. Children wearing such ill-fitting helmets would be street-legal but, in effect, just as unprotected as lid-free children. And, a new study has found that helmets can impact on concentration levels...

Giles Wolfe, manager of the Mountainbike Aerial Display team, has been a key supporter of the Bicycle Helmet Initiative Trust for three years. The MAD team is a central part of BHIT's campaign to make helmet-wearing cool, but Wolfe is concerned that BHIT has perhaps made a tactical error by arguing for helmet compulsion for under 16 year olds instead of its original gameplan of imposing compulsion on under-twelves first.

Chris Murray, Queally's agent, will be calling BHIT today to clarify with the Reading-based charity that the Olympic gold medal winning cyclist is pro-helmet but cannot be used to endorse Eric Martlew's private members' bill. This follows yesterday's news that Nationwide is downgrading its support of BHIT because of its political lobbying activities.

Nationwide Building Society has sponsored the Bicycle Helmet Initiative trust for two years but has decided to lower its cash input immediately and withdraw its support completely by the end of the year. Nationwide has specified that its current cash input must only be used for "direct educational purposes" and not for political lobbying.

In Prime Minister's Question Time on 31st March, Eric Martlew MP asked Tony Blair whether the government would support his 'protective headgear for young cyclists' private members' bill. The Prime Minister stopped short of offering full support but did say "we will certainly give careful consideration to this Bill, and if we can support it, I am sure that we will." But was that the line he was meant to take?

Thursday 15th April: Fatal head injuries need not be bike-related, even for cyclists

Sadly, an Australian cyclist - well-known to Aussie pro roadies - died yesterday after sustaining a head injury whilst showering. In a bizarre twist, before the reporting of this tragedy, contributors to the trade-only bulletin board of this site had been discussing creating the Shower Helmet Initiative Trust, a spoof charity to challenge the single-issue myopia of BHIT, the Bicycle Helmet Initative Trust

Roads minister David Jamieson, previously thought to be warming Eric Martlew's helmet compulsion private members' bill although Department for Transport bods are against it, recently told MPs that enforcement would be too tough, so there will possibly be no government support for a lid law. PLUS: a research document from the House of Commons Library provides MPs with a superb summary of both sides in the helmet debate.

Eric Martlew, the MP with a private members' bill to force under-16s to wear helmets when cycling, is to take part in a webchat on the MPs' lobby section of BBC.co.uk. Questions and comments are invited. Remember, Martlew believes those who challenge his bill are "cycling fascists."

It's unlikely, but this could depend on the fuss that gets made. Uncontroversial private members' bills sometimes go through 'on the nod', controversial ones can get talked out, officially objected to or adopted by the government by the promise of an enquiry. If Eric Martlew MP thought mandatory cycle helmets for children was a 'soft' issue, one that nobody could seriously object to, he clearly wasn't briefed very well by the Bicycle Helmet Initiative Trust.

Eric Martlew MP branded the Association of Cycle Traders as "cycling fascists" when he learned the bicycle dealer organisation was opposed to his helmet mandation bill for children. BikeBiz.com is pro-helmet but anti-compulsion. And it's important to note this is also the view of the not-at-all-lunatic-fringe British Medical Association.

You can't turn the page of a newspaper, or scroll down a news website, without tripping over yet another story about blubber. We're drowning in the stuff. And, as we're constantly told, children of today are more sedentary than ever before. One way for kids to get in a dose of daily exercise is cycling to school and many UK government departments are linking up to encourage safe routes to school. So, why are the two people pictured here behind a Bill that would likely lead to a drop in cycling levels among children?

Quite apart from the fines levied on parents for allowing their children to cycle without head-protection and the likelihood the police will probably not enforce any lid law, there's also the possibility that anybody allowing under-sixteen year olds to cycle helmet-less could be sued by parents, if those children subsequently injured themselves?

The Department for Transport has today published the first review of the UK government's Road Safety Strategy to coincide with World Health Day, which this year is focussing on the global road safety challenge. CTC says it likes some bits of the review, dislikes other parts.

Perhaps. That's when Eric Martlew's private member's bill, 'protective headgear for young cyclists', gets its second reading. Many MPs support Martlew's bill. Any measure that says it aims to save children's lives is a vote winner. But will a kid lid law, in fact, lead children to ditch their bikes, leading to the unintended consequence of more deaths via obesity-related illnesses? MPs need to be better informed. To date, they seem to have absorbed only BHIT's argument. Time to write to your MP...

Those that disagree with Eric Martlew's helmet compulsion bill can expect short shrift from the Carlisle MP. As well as having a go at a bike shop member of the Association of Cycle Traders, he also rounded on Mark Brown, the ACT's relatively new sales and marketing manager.

Many cyclists report being nude without their polystyrene prophylactics and this must be music to the ears of suppliers and retailers who sell cycle helmets but if legislation was enacted that forced cyclists - under-16s first, but the Bicycle Helmet Inititiative Trust wants compulsion for all - to don head protection would this scare away non-enthusiast cyclists and lead to drop in cycling?

Marina Hyde's diary section of The Guardian today pokes fun at Eric Martlew, the Labour MP for Carlisle. The piece alleges that Martlew responded to a letter from an IBD by saying the IBD would be shamed in public as "more interested in selling bikes than saving lives."

Thursday 1st April: Brit PM says child helmet law may get government support

In yesterday's Prime Minister's question time in the House of Commons, Tony Blair said his government would give "serious consideration" to the issue of compulsory cycle helmet wearing for under-16s. The answer was prompted by Eric Martlew, Labour MP for Carlisle, who said such legislation had the support of 80 percent of the British population. If Martlew's private member's bill was passed, bicycle retailers, parents, 16-year old brothers, sisters and friends of child cyclists could face fines for not forcing children in their presence to wear helmets when cycling.

Todays proposal by Eric Martlew MP that it should be made illegal for under-sixteens to cycle without wearing helmets, is likely to exacerbate the problem of obesity amongst the young says a coalition of cycling and health organisations.

Thursday 18th March: 'Child helmet compulsion' bill will not get government support

That's the reading-between-the-lines conclusion reached by most bike bigwigs at the third annual Cycling Forum for England meeting held at the Department for Transport in London yesterday. Dr. Kim Howells, a transport minister since last July, told the assembled great-and-good that despite wearing a cycle helmet himself  he's a GT-riding roadie  he doesn't believe any helmet compulsion law could be enforced in England. Therefore Eric Martlew's private members bill will likely not be supported by the DfT.